The monies themselves, and the circuits being used to convey money from one node to another, do not present quite such an array of choice as might initially appear to be the case. Many of the new payment systems that are available involve partnerships with established financial services companies: wave and pay operates through Visa, for example; Google Wallet works in partnership with Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover; iZettle works with American Express and MasterCard. It is therefore worth pausing to ask why there has been such an explosion of payment services in recent years, before discussing what it might mean for the future of money.
Google Wallet and Wave and Pay are forms of “mobile money” that have been developing alongside the growth of alternative monies. Mobile monies appeal to users because they remove from the act of payment the inconveniences and impositions associated with traditional banking.

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The idea that you can “buy stuff just by asking for it” suggests a world in which we could behave as if money did not exist. If one could get credit in one’s bones, a whole host of practical problems—losing your card, having it stolen, verifying your ID—would evaporate. It is striking how close Stephenson gets to the spirit of what money has become: forms of mobile money such as contactless payment or Wave and Pay appear to render money as inconspicuous as it can possibly be—short of having your credit limit injected into your pelvis. In 2004, the Baja Beach Club in Barcelona launched a new payment system for its VIP members: a VeriChip implant lodged inside a 1-mm-diameter glass capsule injected beneath the skin. “We are the first discotheque in the world to offer the VIP VeriChip. Using an integrated (imbedded) microchip, our VIPs can identify themselves and pay for their food and drinks without the need for any kind of document,” the club announced.

While reintermediating an existing payments business, mPesa brings in added efficiency to the transaction, without reinventing the end-user behavior.
BACKWARD COMPATIBILITY AS A ROAD TO GRADUAL BEHAVIOR DESIGN
Any form of payment has to combat a behavioral problem. Hence, building in some form of ‘backward compatibility’ helps spur adoption because users have the choice to continue with the existing method or transition to a new one. Visa and MasterCard have extensive experience regarding disrupting the payments space. When Wave and Pay were first introduced, the new cards that were issued supported both swipe (existing) and wave (new) modes of payment. Consumers could continue using swipe until merchants set up enough wave terminals. Additionally, a string of incentives to early adopters of wave helped increase the adoption of wave.
PLATFORM SCALE IMPERATIVE
Platforms that require near-simultaneous adoption by two markets may find it difficult to achieve traction if they try to create new behaviors on both sides.

In the developed world, there has also been a rush to adopt and deploy mobile phone payment systems. MasterCard and Visa have implemented numerous NFC payment programs that allow users to launch an app on their phones and wave or tap the device on a contactless sensor to quickly charge goods and services. From Starbucks, to Best Buy, to parking meters in San Francisco and cabs in New York City, “wave and pay” is increasingly the choice of users for quick checkout and payment. Though Google was an early adopter of NFC payment systems for its Android phones, in September 2014 Apple joined the bandwagon and added swipe-and-pay technology to its latest batch of iPhones. Within the Android ecosystem, Google’s Wallet payment system allows users to store their debit and credit card information with Google and launch the Google Wallet app to check out in an increasing number of stores via any PayPass-enabled store checkout terminal.

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RFID tags are printed electronic circuits no thicker than a piece of paper, often come in sticker format, many the size of a dime, and can be produced for under a penny. They are capable of performing real-time, constant data exchange and can be read by scanners, some as far as up to one hundred meters away. Even if you are unfamiliar with RFID technology, chances are you have already encountered it in your life, whether it’s the security ID card you use to swipe your way into your office, your “wave and pay” credit card, the key to your hotel room, your subway pass, or the little box you use to pay for highway tolls, such as E-ZPass. Though the convenience of RFID, considered by many the gateway to the Internet of Things, sounds great, there’s one problem: it’s eminently hackable.
There have been dozens of exploits against RFID technology, whose electronics can be readily hacked, spoofed, and jammed, and there is an active “RFID underground” continually working on improving its offensive techniques.